1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device for automatically locking a power button in a computer, more particularly to the device for automatically locking the power button in the computer which prevents the computer power from turning off even though a child presses the power button during the computer operation at home, and thus a user can continue to do his computer work.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A computer is frequently used at home due to a spread of low price computers. A computer user can do a variety of computer work, e.g., text editing, figure drawing, internet surfing, and communication, etc., at home. However, when the computer is used at home when a child present, the child may frequently press a button installed at a keyboard or at a computer main body because the child may be full of curiosity or may want to attract the computer user's interest. Especially, when the child presses a power button in the computer main body during the computer work, the computer work is able to be interrupted, and important data may be lost.
For example, as shown in FIG. 3, when the child presses the power button 420 installed at the computer main body 400 during the computer work with a mouse 500, the user loses the unstored data. Further, the user has a problem that the computer operation does not continue because the computer must be turned on again for resuming his computer work.
Therefore, various methods for preventing the loss of data which may occur when the electric power is removed unexpectedly are proposed.
One such method described in the patent to Brandin, U.S. Pat. No. 5,193,176, "computer work saving during the power interruption" discloses the saving apparatus and method of the computer work for preventing the loss of the application program or the loss of data by storing the advanced application program or the data connected with the advanced application program into the nonvolatile memory as the back up area even though the power is abruptly removed during the running of the application program.
However, the conventional system saves the state of the advanced application program and the related data in the nonvolatile storage medium under backup power when the power source is abruptly turned off during the running of the application program. Thus, the conventional system for preventing the loss of the application program or the loss of data in the computer is inconvenient because the main power source must resume when the user wants to continue to do his computer work. Further, the conventional system has a problem that the user cannot continue to work.